Apple Watch X-ray Teardown

There were a lot of unsolved mysteries after we tore down the Apple Watch, and that made us sad. So naturally, we made friends with the folks at Creative Electron to get a Superman-esque look at what’s tickin’ in Apple’s timepiece. After spending the day playing with their magic science machines, we’re pleased to present to you an intensively investigated teardown of the Apple Watch, X-ray style.

But wait, there’s more! All the while, our friends at Chipworks were continuing their own investigation, and found some big news about what's hiding within the S1 System in Package.

We’ve heard that secrets, secrets are no fun—unless you share with everyone. So we’re ready for some show and tell:

• The Apple S1 System in Package (SiP) is composed of over 30 individual components, attached to a single board that is then overmolded with a silica or aluminum composite resin—similar to conventional IC packaging, but for an entire board.

• By encasing the S1 in resin, Apple was able to make use of wire bonding to make many of the connections between chips in PoP stacks. These are incredibly small bonds, typically 10-17 microns.

• At the heart of the S1, Apple's new APL0778 processor is fabbed on Samsung's 28 nm LP process.